Definition of asthma in children 6–11 years

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory lung condition, clinically defined as the combination of variable respiratory symptoms (e.g. wheeze, breathlessness, chest tightness, cough) and variable airflow limitation.

‘Asthma’ is a diagnostic label for a group of lung diseases with various disease mechanisms. Multiple asthma phenotypes have been identified, including allergic asthma and nonallergic asthma.

The diagnosis of asthma in children 6–11 years is based on:

• a history of typical symptoms (wheeze, breathlessness, chest tightness, cough) that vary over time in frequency and severity
• documentation of variable expiratory airflow (with or without airflow limitation compared with population norm)
• a low probability that findings are due to an alternative diagnosis.